McSWEENEY'S INTERNET TENDENCY'S PATREON

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TRENDALERT! COOLKIDSARELETTINGTHEIRPARENTSCOMEANDVISITFOR A WEEK!

Heard about that new trend all the Cool Kids are doing?

Yessir, the hip thing this year for young people who’ve moved away is to invite their parents to come and visit for a week!

These kids say it’s the perfect opportunity to entertain guests, catch up on family news—and to have those long, drawn-out conversations young people just love to have with their parents. You know, about the job search or why they’re not married yet and whether they’ve put on a few pounds since graduation.

“You’re just getting older,” parents like to reassure them. “It happens to everybody.”

And parents say they have story after story to tell from back home: Like about that kid from school their child never really knew but whose parents still keep in contact with everyone from the ol’ PTA.

Sources who were at the grocery store last week suggest those parents just came back from a week-long visit with this kid—and that they can’t stop talking about what a swell time they had!

“Oh, doing wonderful,” one parent told them. “Couldn’t be better. Just started at this financially lucrative, high-profile job in the entertainment business. And next year we’re all set to go back for the wedding. What’s your child doing?”

Parents will later tell their children that they didn’t know how they should respond, exactly. "So I just told them you were still finding yourself—which is perfectly natural at your age.”

But it’s not just parents from school. Ones from church and book club are making the trip, too. And those parents agree that the value isn’t just about meeting their kids’ new friends or finding out about their new lives (because someone doesn’t update their Facebook page like they used to). No, these parents say there’s mounting evidence that they have a lot of advice to give today’s youth about the job market, too!

Most parents, for example, recently read an article about that man who founded Twitter. Or maybe it was another one of those internet companies. And it might not be the founder either. But the article did say something about how this person was involved with the apps or something. And how he made all this money. And that lots of young people are making money in the Internet. And if that’s something a young go-getter is interested in, maybe they should think about calling the Twitter people or whoever it was for a job.

“Because my child fixed our computer last Christmas and would be perfect at all that,” says every parent. “Just perfect.”

Parents also say that they understand the job scene isn’t always so hot for recent college grads (what with the economy and 9/11 and everything). So if their pride-and-joy needs to step out for an interview or something, parents say they can just entertain themselves for a spell. Heck, who knows: Maybe they can just “hang” with their kids’ roommates and talk about “whatever”!

Of course, if their kids do have a job (and it’s not too much of a bother), parents say they’d just love to pop by and see the place. They insist their child’s coworkers would get a kick out of hearing one story after another about how wonderful their kid is, and what they were like as a child—and how long their mother was in labor—and why they think their child deserves a raise (if not outright wonder aloud “why they don’t just put you in charge”).

Jobs aside, however, parents say there’s a more serious reason for these trips to the Big, Bad City—and that’s to check on their child’s safety.

“Because this one time, Walter Cronkite did a story about where you live,” parents will say. “And it was about this young person, who was about your age, and who came here right after college. And how it wasn’t long before this person was mugged and beaten and murdered and they didn’t find the body for days. And it just upset the parents so. And I think the child was a writer or musician or something, too. And the report just talked about how awful crime was here and how it was just rampant, and no one had any solutions—even though I’m sure it’s perfectly safe nowadays and that you would do nothing wrong.”

But the biggest benefit of all from these visits? That free dinner parents like to buy their kids. Parents say expense is no option. And that maybe the whole family can go to this place the parents saw on the cooking show they like to watch. Because this one episode had this chef who ran this restaurant that’s in the very same city—and the food just looked so good and everybody there seemed to be having such a great time.

“It starts with an ‘L’ or it has an ‘L’ in it,” they say. “You know the one.”